Earlier this week, Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) lashed
out at the community organization New York Communities for Change, urging U.S.
Attorney Loretta Lynch to investigate
FoxNews.com's quickly denied "report" that NYCC had
"engaged
in fraud through its participation in the Occupy Wall Street protests."
While Issa's targeting of a liberal organization is no surprise, it does expose
his utter hypocrisy.

Issa had no problem demanding investigations based on
anonymously sourced FoxNews.com reports. But back in September, he downplayed and
refused to investigate allegations that Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. may have
tried to hack the phones of 9/11 victims, citing in part that there was no "on-the-record credible
allegation." The allegation against News Corp. came from a "former New York
cop" who is now a private investigator (certainly a more specific and credible
description than Fox's "sources") and told
the U.K.'s Daily Mirror in July that "he was contacted by
News of the World journalists who said they would pay him to retrieve the
private phone numbers of the dead."

For months, News
Corp. has been rocked by revelations that News
of the World engaged in a pattern of phone hacking and bribery. The scandal
has brought
down
executives, reporters, editors, and government officials, and led to Murdoch's
grilling before a parliamentary committee.

Following
the Mirror report, the FBI began an
investigation. Rep. Bruce Braley (D-IA) also called on Issa to conduct Oversight
Committee investigations. Issa was challenged on his refusal to do so during a
September 20 C-Span interview. During the interview, Issa repeatedly claimed
the original report on the hacking of 9/11 victims' phones had come from
"left-wing blog" ThinkProgress.

ISSA: When a left-wing blog wants
to make a quote, fine, I'll take it on its merit. Here's the facts: There is no credible allegation with any specificity
of any wrongdoing by an American unit. Secondly, the Justice Department —
no friend of Rupert Murdoch and Fox News — is investigating. Third,
the Democratically controlled Senate is investigating.

Are we monitoring this, are we staying aware
of it? Absolutely. But with the
resources — you mentioned, taxpayer's resources — if I don't have any kind of a
smoking gun, I don't have any kind of on-the-record credible allegation— In
fact, I have a left-wing blog saying it, and now a left-wing blog saying that I
should have listened to one of my Democratic minority members demanding that we
do it, there's a lot of resources it takes to do it. We are happy to look at
evidence that comes along, and if we see any credible evidence, we want to do
it.

Watch:

Apparently Issa's concern for whether there is an "on-the-record credible
allegation" waxes and wanes depending on whether he is citing News Corp. or
defending them.